The Twilight of the Souls Part 27

"No."

"And what's that?"

He pointed to her eyes. She shrugged her shoulders:

"That's done with a pencil, just a touch. It's nothing. That's not a make-up. Make-up ... is something quite different."

"Oh, really! Well, I don't like all that messing. What do you do it for?"

She looked at him in dismay; and again the blinding shock bored an endless, dead-black perspective before her ... of death. But he saw only the laugh of her golden eyes.

"What do you do it for?" he repeated. "You usedn't to."

"No."

"Then why do it now?"

She made an effort, so as not to cry. She laughed, shrilly; and it sounded like a jeer, as though she were saying, jeeringly:

"I make up my face, but I've got you all the same."

"Give me a towel," he said, roughly.

"No," she said, struggling and releasing herself from his grip.

"Give me a towel."

"No, Gerrit, I won't, do you hear?"

Her eyes just flashed an angry look of dark reproach. But they laughed and mocked immediately afterwards.

He s.n.a.t.c.hed a towel from the wash-hand-stand:

"Come here," he said.

Her first impulse was a storm of seething rage, a rage as on the last occasion, when she locked herself in and he had to go away.... But there was something so cruel and vindictive in his voice, in his glance, in the abrupt movements of his great body that she grew frightened and came:

"Gerrit," she implored, softly, timidly.

"Come here. I don't like all that muck...."

He had wetted the towel. He now washed her face; and he became a little gentler in his movements, glance and voice ... because she was frightened and meek. He washed her face all over:

"There," he said. "Now at least you're natural."

Something like hatred gripped at her heart, but she could not yield to it: her nerves had become too slack for hatred. Besides, she had always, always been very fond of him, just because he was such a strange mixture of roughness and gentleness. She remained standing anxiously in front of him, with her hands in his.

Like that, like that, at any rate, she no longer looked like the picture on a chocolate-box. He was safe now against his sentimentality. But, Lord, how old she looked! Her skin was wrinkled, covered with freckles and blotches. Was it possible that a drop of wet stuff out of a bottle and a touch of powder could cover all that? And the golden eyes of mockery, how ghastly they looked, without the shadows about the brows and lashes!... And yet she kept on mocking him.... But then, suddenly, he felt pity, was sick at having been rough, at pretending to be rougher than he was. He was always like that, always made that pretence, putting on a bl.u.s.tering voice, squaring his broad shoulders, banging his fist on the table ... for no reason, save to be rough ... and not sentimental.

And, seeking for something to say to her, he said, in a voice which she at once recognized, a voice of pity, the gentleness now tempering the roughness, that mixture which she had always loved in him:

"Really, Pauline, you look much prettier like this...."

But she saw the dark vista opening out before her, black as night.

"You're much prettier now. You look a fresh and pretty woman."

Her eyes were laughing.

"You haven't the least need to smear all that stuff on your face."

Her lips were laughing now.

"Come and give me a kiss.... Come...."

He caught her in his arms. He felt her flesh, soft and flabby, as though he were grasping wadding or lace, not as though he were grasping the woman whom he remembered in his glowing memories, a woman of warm marble.

She roused herself, in her desire. She strained her muscles, embraced him with force, with all the science of pa.s.sion which she had acquired during the years. They embraced each other wholly; and their embrace was full of despair for both of them, as though they were both plunging with their intense happiness into a black abyss, instead of soaring to the stars....

She now lay against him like a corpse. Never had he felt so full of heavy melancholy in his heavy, heavy soul. Never had his whole, whole life pa.s.sed before him like that, suddenly, in a flash: his boyhood, Buitenzorg, the river, Constance; his young years as a subaltern, his reckless period, the period of inexhaustible, gay, brutal, young life; and, after that very youthful period, still many long years of youth, with Pauline herself still young, warm marble; and then the sobering down, his marriage and oh, the golden dawn of his children!... He was not old, he was not old, but everything had arrived.... Nothing, nothing more would come but the dragging past of the monotonous years; and, with each year, the bright circles would shift farther and farther apart and the gloom would deepen around him.... Never had he felt so full of heavy melancholy in his heavy, heavy soul.

She, against him, lay like a corpse. He felt her like a bundle of down, of lace, soft and flabby as a pillow, still in his arms. He would have liked to fling her away from him, weary, sick of that tepid flabbiness.

But he kept her in his arms, made her lie against him, suffered the tepid heap of lace and down on his chest. Her eyelids hung closed, as though she would never raise them again. Her mouth hung down, as though she would never laugh again. And yet he continued to hold her like that.

It was not because of his sentimentality, for she was anything but a chocolate-box picture now, and it was not out of a sudden recrudescence of rough sensuality that he now held that flabby bundle in his arms: no, it was from a real, genuine, but heavy and melancholy feeling, a feeling of pity. He had been able to wash the make-up from her face with a towel, but he couldn't fling her from him now, before she herself should raise herself from his arms. And she remained lying, like a corpse. G.o.d, what a time it lasted!... Still, he couldn't do it: he continued to suffer her there, on his heart. He looked down at her askance, without moving; and his eyes grew moist.... Those confounded eyes of his, which grew moist! He couldn't help it: they just grew moist. He screwed them up, wiped them with his free hand, before Pauline could see them moist.

And he remained like that, so long, so long!... At last he gave a deep sigh and she drew breath; he could not go on: not because of her weight, but because of her softness, that soft flabbiness, that stuffiness, that crumpled lace against him. His chest rose high; and she awoke from her lethargy. She lifted her heavy eyelids, she pinched her lips into a smile. It was a smile of utter despair....

She released herself from his arms, stood up; and he made ready to go.

"Gerrit," she said, faintly.

"What is it, child?"

"Gerrit," she repeated, "you don't know how glad I am that I ... that I met you again ... here ... that we have seen each other again.... I used to think of you so often ... in Paris ... because I was always ... a little fond of you ... because you are so gentle and rough in one....

That's how you are ... and that was why I was fond of you.... Oh, it was so nice to see you again ... after so many, many years ... those dirty, dirty years!... It has made me so happy, so happy!... Thank you, Gerrit ... for everything. But I wanted to say...."

"What, child?"

"You had better not come back again.... You know, you had better not come back.... We have seen each other again now: not often, perhaps ten or twelve times, I can't remember.... It was such heavenly, such heavenly happiness ... that I forgot to count the number of times....

But you had better not come back any more...."

"And why not, child? Are you angry ... because I washed your face with that towel?"

"No, Gerrit, it's not that, I'm not angry about that.... I'm not angry at all...."

Indeed, her eyes were laughing. Then she repeated:

"But still ... you had better not come back."

"I see. So you've had enough of me?"